Fringe: A Contiuation
by wearetheborg
Summary: It is 2015. Walter has just vanished off the face of the earth. After finding mysterious notes and clues left by his father, Peter must figure out what happened to his father and decide how his life will continue with his wife and daughter
1. Chapter 1

_**Fringe: The Next Case**_

Chapter 1

As Peter began to open the letter, he couldn't help feeling like something was wrong. Why would Walter have sent him a letter? Did he forget how to use the telephone again? Peter began to remove the envelope's content when he heard laughter from upstairs. He guessed that Olivia was able to coax Etta into bath faster than normal. It usually took at least twenty minutes of screaming, crying, and frustration just to get her to go in the bathroom.

Peter looked at what he had just taken out of the envelope. It was a single long piece of paper with a drawing on it: the outline of a tulip. Perplexed, peter walked over to the phone, still staring at the flower. He picked up the receiver and dialed Walter's home number. Walter still lived in Peter's old apartment and hadn't managed to change the message on the answering machine, so Peter's own voice came through the speaker: "You have reached the Bishop residence. Please leave a message and I'll try to get back to you as soon as I can." Peter hung up and tried the lab.

Astrid answered, but before Peter could speak, she asked, "Is he with you? Do you know where he is?"

Walter hasn't run off in years. Where could he have gone? "Astrid, calm down. He's not here. Were you with him? Did you see him leave?"

"Peter, he just disappeared."

"What do you mean, disappeared?"

"He literally vanished. He was here, but when I asked him a question, he didn't say anything. I turned around, and he was gone. Just like that."

"Could he have walked outside?"

"Peter, he was milking Gene. There's no way he could have gotten up and walked all the way across the lab to the door without me noticing."

"Alright, I'm on my way." Peter slammed down the phone and ran towards the door. On his way he called upstairs.

"Honey, I'll be right back." Olivia came out of the bathroom and looked down at her husband.

"Where are you going?"

"To the lab at Harvard. Walter wants me there. I have no idea why." Peter rushed out the door, into his car, and drove away. He didn't want to worry Olivia yet. Something was very wierd about this situation. All Peter could think of was the alternate universe. Could they have taken him somehow? And if they could, why would they? And what does that tulip mean?

All he cared about was getting some answers.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Peter entered the lab, but something felt different than it had before. Yes, he had not been to the lab for a while, at least a couple of months now, due to the stress of his new job, but something was definitely off. Being one of the chief engineers at Massive Dynamic is a tall order, and he was barely able to visit his father. Still, Peter knew that something was terribly wrong.

Astrid was sitting in a chair with her hands over her face. She kept thinking to herself that it was somehow her fault. She should have been paying more attention to Walter. Something was off with him today. There were no obscure experiments. The only time he touched his Easy-Bake oven was to put it up on a shelf. He did a lot of organizing and cleaning up today. That was what was bothering Astrid the most. He never tidied up; he always left that to Astrid. Did he know that he was leaving?

"Astrid," Peter said as he rushed over to where she was sitting. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, Peter, I'm fine. I'm just worried. What if he's wandering around out there all by himself? What if he gets lost?"

"It's alright, Astrid. He'll turn up. Just tell me what happened." Astrid recalled the last few hours, explaining Walter's peculiar behavior and sudden disappearance.

"Peter, do you think it could be the other side? Do you think Walternate took him?"

"That crossed my mind, too, but I don't know why he would do that. He didn't have any cause. I think we should just wait it out. I bet that he'll turn up."

"I hope so, but I'm skeptical. He practically vanished right in front of me."

"Maybe your right, but I don't want to jump to any conclusions."

Astrid got up from her chair and began to walk towards the door. "Where's Olivia?"

"She's still at home with Etta. I didn't want to worry her with this just yet."

"Peter, why did you call me in the first place? Did you know that Walter was gone?"

"No, I just received this strange letter from him." Peter removed the picture of the tulip from his pocket and showed it to Astrid. "I wanted to ask him what it meant. Do you have any idea?"

"I haven't the slightest. Do you think it could be linked to his disappearance?"

"Possibly, but I don't see how."

"Me neither. I'm going to go out and get something to eat; I haven't had anything since breakfast. Do you want to come?"

"No, I'm fine. I'll stay here and see if I can find anything that might help us explain this."

"Alright, good luck."

"Thanks." Astrid walked out the door and closed it behind her. Peter was left alone in the lab in search of clues as to why Walter would suddenly vanish. He decided to check his father's office first.

As he walked in the door, he saw something on the desk: a videocassette tape. Peter hadn't seen one of these in years, but he was not surprised that his nostalgic father would have some lying around. Peter picked up the tape. The label read, "For Peter Bishop Only" in Walter's handwriting. He walked over to the television on the other side of the office and quickly inserted the cassette into the VCR. Walter appeared on the screen. He appeared gloomy in a way; he didn't look like is normal, joyful self. Walter's message began to play.

_"Peter, I sent you a letter. It contains something of mine. I imagine you called me to ask, 'Why would you send such a strange letter?' And when you tried to call, I didn't answer, so you tried to find me at the lab. But I was not to be found. I was here one moment and vanished from the face of the Earth the next._

_ "I want you to know, I'm fine, living many, many years from now. You will never see me again. You will never see me again because it had to be this way, to ensure the future of our humanity, your future, the future of Olivia, and the future of Etta._

_ "I don't want you to be sad. The time we had together we stole. I cheated fate to be with you, and we shouldn't have had that tome together, but we did. I wouldn't change it for the world. I don't want to say goodbye. But I will say, I love you, Son."_

Peter stared at the now black screen, unable to understand what he had just watched.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Massive Dynamic: the center of the world. Nina practically forced Peter to work there, although it wasn't much of a problem for Peter, anyways. After the death of David Robert Jones, there weren't very many "fringe cases" anymore. A supersized cockroach or a spontaneously combusted apartment building would pop up every now and then, but it wasn't the same as it was before. Olivia insisted on staying at the FBI, even after she had Etta. She was still there, but she hadn't been on scene at an actual case for almost a year. Walter still went to the lab everyday, and so did Astrid, but there wasn't much for them to do. When Peter visited, he usually found them watching old 1950's cartoons while chewing on red licorice twists. Walter still performed his basic, disgusting, pointless experiments, even when there wasn't a case to be solved. He seemed happy, and he was, until he disappeared.

At four o'clock sharp, Peter walked through the sliding glass doors into the lobby of Massive Dynamic. He had called Olivia on the way to New York and told her that he had to drive down to headquarters for important business. Olivia didn't ask why, as she knew that Peter could never tell her; over the past few years, Massive Dynamic had become more secretive than the CIA.

Peter was often called down to New York, even though he generally worked out of the Boston office, but this time, being a Saturday afternoon, he went of his own accord. After checking through security and scanning his ID four times, he was able to reach the elevator lobby. It was a large, round room. A continuous, cylindrical, golden wall reached up from the black tiled floor. The wall began to cave in on itself ever so slightly so that when it reached the 134th floor, it came to a single point. Around the room were ten elevators, all with golden doors except for one. This elevator, located directly opposite from the door to the main lobby and about twice as large as the others, boasted a pair of jet-black doors. Above, a plaque read "Upper Lobby". About a third of the way up the building, a circular glass platform extruded from the wall creating a transparent roof above the main floor. The platform, which was located on 40th floor, marked the split of the building. Below the platform, it was open access, consisting of generic offices for the business end of the company. Above, the halls were lined with labs, archives, whole floors of top-secret documents, and on the top floor, William Bell's old office, now occupied by the one and only Nina Sharp.

Peter pushed the up button next to the black doors. When the elevator arrived, only two people got out, a man and a woman, both dressed in lab coats and holding stacks of paper. They were chatting away about something to do with particle physics, but as soon as they saw Peter, they abruptly stopped their conversation.

"Hello, Mr. Bishop," said the Woman. She exited the elevator and her coworker followed, giving Peter a nod as he passed. Somewhat annoyed with the attention, Peter entered the elevator and pressed the only button he could: "Go".

Ever since he joined the company, Peter has somewhat become a type of royalty. Being the son of Walter Bishop would be reason enough, but the fact that he has met William Bell makes it even a bigger deal, not to mention the fact that Nina raised his wife. Peter is also the only employee in the company that is allowed to call Mrs. Sharp Nina, and almost everyone at the company respects him out of fear of the boss. She's not really that mean, but being the leader of the largest corporation in the world requires a somewhat stern attitude.

When Peter exited the elevator onto the glass platform, he face a new set of 10 elevators, all with black doors except the one which he had just exited, which now had a pair of gold doors. Unlike the ones below, all of these elevators had plaques above them. The one above the gold doors read "Lower Lobby". To left of that were plaques that read "41-50 Bio Labs", "51-60 Chem. Labs", "61-70 Active Storage", "71-80 Long Term Storage", "81-90 Large Labs", "91-110 Archives", "111-120 Offices", "121-130 Offices", and "131-134 Exec. Offices". Peter climbed into the elevator that serviced floors 91 to 110. Once inside, he scanned his ID in the provided slot, lighting up the various buttons on the wall. He pressed the one labeled "105: Temporal".

The elevator opened to a single, windowless room lined entirely in black. With the exception of the area where the elevator shafts were located, the room was a full square. Rows of shelves stretched from wall to wall. Through the stacks of papers, Peter began to search for something to explain what had happened to his father, but as soon as he started to sort through the first stack, he realized that he would never be able to accomplish anything on his own.


	4. Chapter 4

"I was wondering how long it was going to take you to get here," said Nina as Peter walked into her office. All of the walls were white and electronic panels lined the walls. In fact, her desk was one large glass panel with blinking lights and videos playing all over the surface. "Now, Peter. Tell me why you are interested in our files on time travel."

"I wanted to figure out how to build a Tardis," responded Peter in an obvious sarcastic tone. "I've taken interest in sci-fi again, although that 12th doctor, I can't stand her. Why did they have to make her a ginger?"

"Peter, I haven't the slightest idea or care as to what you are talking about but we need to be serious now. I want to help you in anyway I can. Did your father put you up to this? Is he interested in a time travel experiment? Peter, whatever you tell me, it will not leave this office. I promise."

After a slight pause, Peter looked Nina directly in the eye. "Walter's gone."

"Gone? I'm assuming you don't mean he just went out for one of little strolls."

"No, Nina, he's just gone. He disappeared right in front of Astrid's eyes. It's like he doesn't even exist at all anymore. All he left behind was this recording." Peter removed his phone from his pocket, to which he had transferred Walter's message. He gave the phone to Nina, who placed it on the desk. With a few beeps, the video emerged directly in front of Nina.

"_Peter, I sent you a letter," _was emitted from unknown sources around the room. Peter pulled out the tulip drawing from his pocket, unfolded it, and placed it on Nina's desk. She was completely engulfed in the video.

Peter stood there awkwardly for the next minute. For some strange reason, Nina's office was not furnished with any chairs other than her own. In fact, there was no other furniture besides the chair and the desk. It wasn't until now that Peter began to worry. He began to feel guilty for not trying to prevent his father's disappearance and then anger at Walter for not telling him about his disappearance before it had occurred; Peter might have been able to prevent it. Why did Walter have to wait until after he was gone to inform Peter of his planned absence? Was it even planned?

Peter's thoughts then drifted to Olivia. How would he tell her that Walter had just mysteriously disappeared? How would he break the news to Etta that she might never see her grandpop again? Peter eventually determined that he needed to get some answers before he could tell his family of the day's occurrences.

_"But I will say, I love you son."_ Nina looked up from her desk. She sat there for a few minutes staring blankly at the wall behind Peter. He could only guess as to what the complex thoughts were that were going through her head.

"Peter, I think I have an idea as to what is going on here. Your father knew that he had to cease to exist in this time so that he would not create a paradox. I can only guess as to the specifics of this paradox, but the moment he disappeared is an important point in time. Something was supposed to happen at that point. Walter somehow knew that this event would occur and was able to prevent it. As to this tulip, I haven't a clue.

"The intriguing fact is that he says that he is alive in the future. It would make a lot more sense if he were alive in the past, because he could have prevented something that would occur at his time of disappearance. I don't understand how his travelling into the future could have prevented something from occurring in the past, unless there was a lot more time travel involved. The important part is that the only way that he would be able to keep this event from occurring would have been for him to stop existing, which is exactly what happened."

"So Walter knew that something was going to happen and he didn't tell any of us?"

"I don't think he could have, Peter. He might have known that you would try to stop him."

"Is there anyway to get him back?"

"No, Peter. Even if we had a way to bring him back, his presence here would create the very thing he tried to prevent. This is the way it has to be Peter. Whatever would have happened must have been so unbearable that he had to resort to this option. I'm sorry, Peter."

"Well we have to find out what really happened. We have to know why he did this."

"Peter, we can't. I already told you that we can't bring him back.

"Nina, I know that we can't bring him back, but why cant we just go and ask him?"


End file.
